A popular romance novelist, Rosemary Rees received early instruction from her sister, Lily, then attended school in Auckland and enrolled at the university college. Up until 1924 her focus was the theatrical world, and in approximately 1900 she went to London, where she joined the company of comedienne Fanny Brough. She also wrote short stories for London journals, and several one-act plays that were staged as curtain-raisers, including 'Her Dearest Friend' (1910). In late 1919 she returned to New Zealand, and in 1921 formed a theatre company whose members included the young Ngaio Marsh, with the idea of touring the country with one of her own comic plays, 'The Mollusc'. Although critically well-received, the venture was not financially viable, and had to be abandoned after five months.
Rees then went to Sydney to find acting work (ca.1922), but was initially unsuccessful. She decided to write a romantic novel in order to meet her financial needs, and in five weeks produced the draft of April's Sowing, after which she obtained a role with J. C. Williamson's company touring New Zealand. While with the Lawrence Grossmith company in Melbourne six months later she learned that her novel had been accepted by publisher Herbert Jenkins (the first publisher she had approached) and that she was contracted to write three more. After that she wrote at least a novel a year, thirty-one in all. Some were serialised in major English and American papers before appearing as books, several were published in America (under different titles), and there were numerous reprints and translations. Many had New Zealand settings. She also wrote a travel book, New Zealand Holiday (1933), following a return visit there in 1932-1933.
Rees continued to travel during the 1920s and 1930s, acting and writing in Australia (Miller claims that she resided in Sydney during 1937), England and America (where she appeared in an early 'talkie'). During the Second World War Rosemary Rees was a volunteer fire warden in London and worked in a Coventry aircraft factory for a year, and in 1955 she returned to live in New Zealand permanently, where she continued to write up until the year before her death.
Source: Dictionary of New Zealand Biography, http://www.dnzb.govt.nz/
